Memorandum submitted by Mrs. Elizabeth
Pullan
Post Offices, especially in rural areas, are
important to local residents for all sorts of reasons, particularly
as rural areas become evermore the habitat of the retired and
elderly. This means that they need to post more items than they
did when they were younger: for a start, they have grandchildren
to whom they send cards and gifts, many of which need to be weighed
and individually stamped. They are also more likely to prefer
the convenience of shopping at home, so parcels have to be received
and goods sometimes returned. Age or diminished income means they
are less likely to be car drivers or to have convenient transport
services to other centres, and, if they do, they may not be able
to manage easily the walk from the transport service to the post
office, or the standing in queues which is often entailed in central
offices. (While there often are queues in rural offices, they
can be accessed relatively easily at less popular times, whereas
transport to larger centres is often only available at busier
times, such as on market days.)
The public, especially the elderly, is continually
enjoined not to carry or store too much cash, but if cash is not
obtainable locally they may need to keep quite a lot to pay for
minor services, whereas, with a local post office and appropriate
bank accounts, it is possible to obtain cash conveniently at shorter
intervals and thus reduce the amount they need to have on their
persons or in their homes at any one time.
Another need for post offices is that they are
often part of retail premises, and without them there may not
be enough trade for a local shop to survive, thus pushing yet
more people into travelling distances for minor supplies. With
government policy attempting to discourage such journeys, the
removal of such essential services as the local supply of milk,
bread, postage, cash, newspapers, etc., would be contrary to policy
and greatly increase peoples' carbon footprints.
The other aspect which is very important is
that, with attempts to restore a sense of local community, the
type of regular chance meetings which happen in small local post
offices and shops is one of the best ways of making sure that
people do have a sense of belonging and knowing their neighbours
without anyone having to set up artificial means to attempt this.
If they alt flash past in their cars there is little chance that
they will ever meet to form a community of any kind.
March 2009
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